But by late morning here, it appeared that AT&T had resumed onlines sale of the iPhone.

The suspension has led some to wonder if this is a way of AT&T slowing down sales of the iPhone to give its network a breather. This comes not long after an AT&T executive acknowledged that the cellular operator has trouble in New York and San Francisco with heavy data traffic.

So what was it? Fraud? A modification of promotions and distribution channels or was AT&T trying to slow down iPhone sales so it could avoid overtaxing its network in New York.